Rockwell invests $15m to ramp up Bengaluru centre

Rockwell said it will hire another 150-200 engineers with varied skills in next four-five years in Bengaluru, which has in the recent past worked on core designs for very simple to complex platforms for the globe.

Industrial automation firm Rockwell Automation is betting on its Bengaluru centre to boost product design for global customers. The company, which has clients such as Tata Motors, Mahindra & Mahindra, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, Toyota and Ford, has invested nearly $15 million to expand its product and platform design activities. It hired 100 people in the past one year to take the headcount to 200.

“We got a mandate to build up the team (in Bengaluru) further. There are eight labs here. One part of our business attracted highest number of talent this year,” said Dilip Sawhney, managing director, Rockwell Automation India, adding that the headcount grew from 10-20 in the beginning to 200 keeping pace with the increased focus on design of automation platforms.

Rockwell and L&T Technology Services have jointly developed a state of the art internet-of-everything lab here.

“LTTS is a partner and we are in the process of scaling up a lab on smart manufacturing which will be available to customers. LTTS can take those solutions to their global customers,” said Sawhney.

He added that through this partnership, the company would get access to some “interesting use cases”.

Analysts say innovation in industries like utilities, manufacturing, automotive and transportation and logistics should be potential growth drivers for industrial automation and internet of things.

Rockwell said it will hire another 150-200 engineers with varied skills in next four-five years in Bengaluru, which has in the recent past worked on core designs for very simple to complex platforms for the globe. The team here includes varied profiles starting from chip designers to hardware analysts. “(We had) multi million dollar capex which is just approved in the range of $15-plus million in the last couple of years and large chunk of it is getting spent now...We do look forward to another similar investment in near future,” said Sawhney.

The company so far looked at a lateral hiring process and now plans to collaborate with universities to get fresh talent on board.